Almost ten months after Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss revealed their plans to launch a fully-regulated Bitcoin exchange based in New York City Gemini was finally launched in October 2015, after being granted a trust charter by the New York Department of Financial Services.

Trading

Gemini is a pure Bitcoin exchange, meaning that there are no other cryptocurrencies available for trading. There is also only one fiat currency that can be exchanged on the platform, which is USD. The latter makes sense as Gemini is currently only available to a certain number of States in the U.S. Besides limited markets to trade in, there are also only limited tools available to do so. Both limit and market order have been enabled, but advanced order types such as stop orders are nowhere to be found. Margin trading and derivatives are not available either. The former features is mentioned in the knowledge base, but there is no mention of this possibly being added in the future. The cost of trading making up a lot, as trade fees are decent at 25 basis points (0.25 percent) per trade. The fees are accompanied by a very liquid platform, resulting in almost no additional costs due to bid-ask spreads. The best bid-ask spread is extremely low at just 2 basis points, and happens to be robust as well. Adjusting for slippage on a Bitcoin transaction worth $1,000 would only increase this number to 3 basis points.

Gemini Trading Summary

Item

Details

# Cryptocurrencies

2 (BTC / ETH)

# Fiat currencies

1 (USD)

Trade fees (trade size $1,000)

0.25%

BTC/USD half bid-ask + impact (trade size $1,000)

0.05%

Minimum trade size

No

Margin trading

Not supported

Derivatives

Not supported

Market orders

Not supported

Advanced orders

Not supported

Funding

Gemini only offers the option for USD funding, but at least this includes ACH transfers as a funding method. This transfer method is usually free, and Gemini does not charge any additional fees either. The exchange will charge a small (unspecified) fee for wire withdrawals on the other hand, while bank charges on this method of transferring will typically amount to around $15 for incoming (domestic) transfers or about $25 for outgoing transfers. ACH transfers are normally also faster than wire transfers, although they will still take up to one business day to be processed.

Gemini Funding Summary

Item

Details

Cheapest funding method available in

United States

Cheapest funding method

ACH

Deposit fees (local)

Free of charge

Withdrawal fees (local)

Free of charge

Instant deposits possible?

No

Bitcoin Deposit fees

Free of charge

Bitcoin Withdrawal fees

Free of charge

Platform

The platform looks like it has been designed with a strong focus on simplicity. The number of available buttons is very low, making the website extremely easy to navigate. The content on each page is also minimized, resulting in a rather pleasant user experience. Security has also been taken into consideration, as two-factor authentication is an obligatory option. Gemini also uses this information to verify the user’s location, and might not have had a choice in this matter. The speed and performance of the website is not as great (e.g. scoring around 50/100 on Google PageSpeed Insights), with pages taking up to several seconds to fully load. The performance on mobile screens is the worst, as the design was not made responsive and therefore not optimized for smaller windows.

Help & Support

The documentation in the help center is as minimalistic as the website’s design, which is not a good sign in this case. For example, the fees on market and limit orders are explained properly, but nothing explains these order types in more detail. Likewise, the order book receives no attention in the knowledge base. These features might be perfectly clear for the average or institutional trader, but to serve a broader target audience these basics should be present. Especially given the fact that the former features are about all the ones that Gemini offers. Furthermore there are only two sentences dedicated to explaining what Bitcoin is. The platform also lacks any form of risk disclosure with regard to trading Bitcoin. Last but not least the exchange can only be contacted by email for additional support.

Legitimacy

The company’s legitimacy has been evaluated with the help of a Fraud Risk Assessment. A summary is provided below, and the full assessment can be found by following this link.

Item

Number

Red flags

0

Warnings

2

A weighting factor of 40% is applied to legitimacy in calculating the final rating. A weighting factor of 25% is applied to both trading and funding, while a weighting factor of only 15% is applied to both platform and support. If the legitimacy score is 0% then the total rating is automatically set to the lowest possible result.

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I would give gemini zero stars if I could. I was initially attracted to their low fees for transacting bitcoin and set up an account. Account opening took about a week and was slower than my initial coinbase setup. The day my account was approved, I went right ahead and ACH transferred the $500 daily maximum to the account, thinking it would immediately pre-credited (as advertised) and I’d be able to buy bitcoin. I got an email from them saying the deposit would be fully credited in 4-5 days. 2 days later, I noticed the funds had been pulled from my B of A checking account, but still no credit to my gemini account. Then I placed a second ACH transfer to said account. This time, it was pre-credited immediately and I bought 0.19 bitcoin. Even though my trade was not executed immediately, so I was supplying liquidity to their market, I was still charged .25%. And I am still out the $500 from my first (initial) deposit. It’s lost somewhere. I have invoked support and emailed them, to no avail. I am at my wits end and strongly considering contacting their regulator to get my money back & closing the account rather than further deepening my involvement with them. Gemini looks like a scam to me, and I feel ripped off beginning to end, starting with my “lost” $500.